Teachings
by SkywardGratis
Summary: Mike Royce taught her how to be strong... but Richard Castle taught her all about love.


This is my first Castle fic; I've been reading on here for a long time but this is the first time I've got something that I feel like publishing. Let me know what you think.

_A x_

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><p>She had been in love with Royce… It took her a long time to realise it but when she had, everything suddenly made sense. The way she'd always try to impress him, how he could get her to do anything for him. It took even longer for her to realise that all along he'd been playing her. Using her to get what he wanted. He had been her training officer and what she learnt from him was the basis of her whole career… but it was also the basis of the rest of her life.<p>

He was never in love with her; In fact he probably never felt anything near romantic feelings towards her. It didn't stop her feelings developing though; and it didn't stop her heart from breaking, he might not feel the same, and he might have taken advantage of her but he done something for her as well… he'd taught her that heart break made you stronger. He taught her not to believe in everything that you thought you knew.

He was the only one who understood what drove her to work even harder. He wasn't like everyone else; he didn't try to stop her from looking into her mother's case. He just told her not to get caught. Not only did he teach her what it meant to be a cop and how to be the best cop she could be, but he taught her how to be strong. How to channel her energy into doing something for everyone else. How to get through each day no matter how bad things got. He was the one who taught her how to listen to the drive within her, the drive that made her fight for justice for the victims when she made detective and the drive that made her the best of all the detectives that Roy Montgomery had ever seen.

But the most important thing he taught her was something even he hadn't realised. He taught her that love hurt, and that she couldn't rely on everyone else to keep her upright.

She was in love with him and he didn't even really care about her but he showed her what being in love was like and all that it brought with it. He was the main reason why she erected a wall around her heart. Her mother's murder had built most of it up, and his betrayal built the rest. She didn't let anyone else in after him. He'd taken something of her and she didn't even know what it was, but he made it impossible to let someone else in… because they never lived up to what he was to her. They could never make her feel the way she he had, and they could never influence her in the same way that he had.

That was until Richard Castle had blundered his way into her life… In the beginning he was just an annoying puppy following her around but over time she realised that he was slowly but steadily taking down the wall around her heart; brick by _frikin' _brick. She fought it, she fought it harder than she'd ever fought something in her life but she couldn't do it. She couldn't stop him from getting in. Once he'd built that door in her wall she knew there was no way to stop him from discovering everything. But surprisingly that didn't scare her as much as it should have done. She still tried to fight him at every step but it was like he had something that that could always overpower her. No matter how hard she tried to get him out of her life.

Over the years they'd had their ups and downs. They'd both hurt the other and been hurt by other people but together they'd made it through. She didn't know how but somehow they had made it through it all. He'd got inside of her heart in a way that no one else had ever done. She hadn't realised to begin with but he'd taught her far more than Royce ever had. He'd taught her how to be strong but how to let other people help her as well.

Mike taught her how to be the strongest person she could be and Rick taught her how she didn't have to always be so strong. He taught her that being weak wasn't as bad as she thought; that having a weakness didn't mean she wasn't independent and strong on her own; that it didn't have to mean that someone could hurt her, but that she could learn to be a different kind of strong. Rick taught her how to love and be loved in return and he taught her the most important thing of all; that sometimes, just sometimes, she was stronger when she had someone else helping her stand tall.

Mike Royce had been her first true love, and he'd hurt her in the worst way imaginable but Richard Castle was her last true love and he was truer to his word than anyone else she'd ever met; he would never intentionally hurt her and he would always try to help her in the best way he knew how. They might not agree on what he did and why he did it but she knew that in the end, everything he did, he did for her and for her best interests.

It hadn't been easy but in the end she'd learnt that her mother had been right, as she almost always was, and that life never gave you more than you could handle. In fact she learnt that sometimes it gave you a hell of a load to deal with but it also gave you the means of working past it all. It gave you everything you needed to get through it and all you had to do was take hold of it with both hands and it was everything you never even realised you needed.

That was what how she now lived her life; she'd given herself over to Rick and he'd given her back the part she hadn't really realised was missing, and together, they made each other whole, and most importantly strong. In the end she realised that she had everything she needed in her life because Rick was nothing like Royce had been. He said he'd be there for her as long as she needed him to be; and he had and would be… _always. _


End file.
